Forever
by We Stole Vodka From The Optic
Summary: "Father? Where is Mother?" - Wizard doesn't have the heart to tell her.


Forever

* * *

Immortality.

A curse. A gift.

Living eternally.

No one wants that.

Least of all Wizard.

* * *

Cecaniah is the first to notice. Perhaps Orion is too young to understand the concept. Or maybe it is because their daughter is incredibly intuitive, and takes after Wizard in that aspect. He's staring out the window, watching the snow curl in the air like dancing seraphims, like stars littering a cold, dark sky.

"Father." So business-like, Cecaniah. She would make a great farmer, one day. If she didn't enjoy her books and studying so much.

"Cecaniah…?" He turns toward her, gray hair hanging in his heterochromatic eyes. He's tried to push away the emotions… but everything inside of him…

He knew this would happen. Sooner or later.

Cecaniah's green eyes are a mirror of his own, though hers are wrought in confusion, as Wizard's is wrought and cast in agony. Betraying those emotions that swirled inside of him like a vicious maelstrom.

"What… is it?" He refuses to look his daughter in the eye. And she knows that something is very, very wrong.

"Where is Mother?"

* * *

"_I will always be by your side. Faithfully."_

It's a lie he doesn't want to admit.

* * *

"You idiot!"

The Witch stomps her foot angrily on the ground, and the stoic glare Wizard offers her only infuriates her more. She crosses her arms, flips back curled silver hair, and wrinkles that stupid, scrunchy nose of hers. Wizard hates her, and yet… it's a feeling he feels for her.

He doesn't want to feel anything for the Witch. For anyone.

Emotions only lead to unwanted pain when you were an immortal.

"What… do you want?" His voice is broken by years, decades, centuries of not using it. The Witch closes her eyes, and cracks one open to give him a one-eyed glare, seeped in the color of twinkling candlelight. Of stars and flickering fires.

But there's a seriousness present in the usually whimsical and mischievous Witch that worries Wizard slightly. She has lost… a lot. As has he.

"You know this is only going to end in tragedy, don't you?"

And that simple, single word that angers the Witch even more passes from the Wizard's soft lips,

"Yes…"

* * *

"… Hikari is…" He starts, then stops, then tries to start up again but the words cannot come out of his mouth.

Cecaniah is glaring at him now. Her eyes are like the Witch's. Like stars and candlelight.

_You know this will only end in tragedy don't you? _The words blur together in his head, running and running and running until there's nothing but those words and those words alone. Cecaniah was their first child and she… she deserved to know.

But the words cannot come out of his mouth. It would be admitting… that Hikari was…

No.

He cannot think it either.

"Father," Cecaniah takes a rebellious step forward, her gray bangs sweeping her face and her voice rising in slight anger. She was too serious, too intuitive for her age. "_Where is Mother!"_

* * *

"_These feelings…"_

He's not supposed to have them.

He can't be with Hikari forever.

Wizard knows this…

But he loves her.

"_Weird…"_

* * *

Wizard holds their daughter in his arms and… for once, his worries about living forever and leaving Hikari behind leave him.

"Amazing…" He's nearly speechless. Their daughter's eyes are a beautiful green. Hikari looks up at him, an exasperated and yet, warm smile spreading over his face. "A name…"

"I…" Hikari coughs, slightly. "I have a name…"

"Cecaniah…"

Wizard nearly laughs, and looks down at their daughter, their daughter Cecaniah.

"The Grey Witch."

* * *

Cecaniah's face is blank.

"Dead…?" The tears pool up at the corners of her green eyes, and Cecaniah hastily wipes them away. She has to be strong. For Orion, for her Father. But the tears keep coming and Cecaniah lets the novel in her arms drop to the floor and the tears run quickly down her cheeks.

Wizard pulls his daughter into a hug and simply cries. The emotions inside of him can no longer be bottled up.

He has to live on.

For Hikari.

* * *

_Im-mor-tal-ity_

_-noun_

_1. To live forever. To not be mortal._

_2. The ability to not die. Mortally or in people's hearts and minds._

He has to go on.

Even if he doesn't want to.

* * *

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